He scissors his torso wide,

rope wound tightly

to keep insanity in,

trembling in convulsions,

pain upheaves in torrents,

broken threads, crumbling psyche

walking barefoot in troubled mind.

       Nightmares stuffed in jars

Shovels a fake outside

won’t expose bowels of inside.

Electricity strikes bolts like

pins and needles in his brain

as he cons his game

and feigns his truth

in violent purple slashes

of clouded sanity.

       Nightmares stuffed in jars

Wolves howl within his anguish

broken mirrors surround

shattered tumbling tears,

unable to witness heartless sun.

He feels his dripping sweat

through burning of surrender,

flashes of knotted destiny

scrawled on his face.

Of all he has lost,

he misses mind the most

       Nightmares stuffed in jars

                   Every morning in order to attend my first class, I am forced to take an isolated winding path.I hesitate every time I approach it, something about the shape causes my senses to heighten. It is paved with a peculiar dark sediment blacker than tar. Each curve is careless and lazy as a snake's slinking body. On this particular morning, I hesitated as always. A feeling in my gut held me back from trespassing onto the walkway. As I hesitated, the world began to move in slow motion as I witnessed a boy take the fatal step onto the slick black pavement. He was unaware as his gate slowed, each step harder to take. Eyes wide he looked down and panicked as one foot had been engulfed in a slimy substance. I watched on as he tried to free himself, but the wild curves of the dark road began to roll and writhe. The boy sank lower and lower as the substance climbed up his wriggling body.  I stood still as I witnessed the last strand of hair atop the boy's head smothered by the black ooze. My heart hammered as the creature, now satisfied, slithered into a nearby bush. Beads of sweat now slipped down my face as I fled frightened out of my wits. The next morning I dropped the class. 

It started with a pop

Followed by a drip.

Then I tried to walk

But I kinda tripped.

The cold gel a conduit

The pressure gave a look

Vision peering at it

Then I shook and shook

Please don't move

But lay on the left

It will now improve

Energy gone, now bereft.

Sit up and do it

Listen, we say how

Doing every bit

It is the last one now.

Arms around, propped

Leaning in, pushing

Exhaustion, then stopped

Pressure all rushing

The wailing starts

She is here wet and red

Oh my that smarts

I stroke her little head.

Looking down

She is looking up

I nuzzle her crown

My lovely little pup.

I speak for those

who are breathless

and have lost their tongues,

their minds, but are still

uttering words

into space, still trying to

produce echoes

that bounce off of comets,

and fall to match

the rhythm of the rain;

so that even your

Tears have room

to speak

Jack and Diane were there in the kitchen arguing again about the damn ring he refused to wear, but insisted he must have as a symbol of his commitment. He stepped forward, knowing she'd accept his hug. While grinning over his shoulder she was staring excitedly at the beach just beyond the glass of the tiny window over the sink. Thrilled by the knowledge that soon she'd be using it to make this disappointing little piece of metal disappear and with it this hopeless man-child. As he turned from her, she ran the opposite direction to the deck. With all she had she hurled its slight heft through the aquamarine sky not watching where it went so there could be no retrieval of it or the failed relationship.

I.

The first time I thought about my body

I was a sticky thirteen.

My religion teacher was always telling us,

"Your body is a temple,"

which just meant,

"Don't have sex,"

because

you know

Jesus Hate Sluts.

Ten years later, everyone says,

"LOVE YOUR BODY,"

and I can't stop checking myself out in every mirror I pass.

"Love your body," whispered like a prayer

& all I hear is,

"Your body is a temple.

Your body is a temple.

Your body is a FUCKING TEMPLE."

What a joke:

I never hated my body

until someone told me not to.

II.

"Your body is a temple."

My body is a wasteland.

My body is an empire, long-fought-over and oft-desecrated by a war I didn't start, fought with curling irons and tubes of lip gloss.

My body is a canvas upon which I have painted a thousand versions of myself - versions I'd hardly recognize now, versions I wish I could get back.

My body is evidence in the crime of my life that proves

definitively

I did not sit back.

I was not a passive observer.

My body is a vessel, which is to say

it is nothing / it is everything.

"Your body is a temple."

Don't tell me about my body.

I've seen my reflection.

It doesn't tell half the story.

III.

At work, Bobby the Regular always sits at the bar

and greets me with, "You look gorgeous."

He looks me dead in the eye with such grave importance,

like the revelation might save my life,

or like he's the first man to ever wanna fuck me.

I know he thinks he's doing me a favor,

but

I've never felt less confident

than when a strange man

tells me I'm beautiful.

IV.

The first time my daughter comes crying to me that she hates her body,

I will not tell her she is wrong.

Instead, I will look her in the eye and say,

"Your lungs fill up with air involuntarily

& your heart beats 80 times per minute

& when you fall off of your bike and skin your knee, you cry because it hurts

& your body is not a temple.

You don't have to worship at its altar."

I will tell her all the things I should have told myself.

You are leaving things behind that will continue to exist as you go. You are moving toward your future and all that awaits you. You're success in its infancy and understanding in its maturity. Know that you do in fact know. Embrace that knowledge when you are searching or questioning your journey. It is your journey. It has been laid at your feet. Put your ruby red toe on the tip of the yellow brick road and don't look back even when the lion calls.

Our past is what adds the warmth to the dough of our life so that it rises and finds a new shape. Allowing the leavening is what moves the process along. If this step is skipped it will ruin the outcome. Get in there and create a past you cherish so you'll be ready to kneed the bread of your life preparing it to rise again and find a newer and even tastier result. C'est manifique!

Life will show it's wear tear on most of us in one way or another. But if we didn't get our hair loved off and get wobbly in our joints from a full life of adventure then what would we be? I venture to say we'd be perfect and shiny and new on a shelf unhurt, untouched and unloved. We wouldn't have become real in any way. (Credit The Velveteen Rabbit)

A favorite saying is, "You don't have to believe everything you think." Blind belief is leaving us bereft of original thought, empty slates where plans used to be and bouncing about searching for the safest place to land. There's a loss of connection with ourselves or the ability to honestly reflect, grow and learn. Discover your truth and stand in it no matter where you are. Stand in it.